JOURNAL 95 



there are none. The quadruped skeletons of the 

 Edinburgh College of Surgeons are on the whole well 

 put up, but hardly one of them is perfect. The lioness 

 is good so is the elephant and so are several 

 others. Altogether they are a hundred times better 

 than those of the Glasgow College, the Andersonian 

 Institution, the Liverpool Institution, and the Dublin 

 College of Surgeons. So far good. But if the Edin- 

 burgh collection were mine, and I had hands enough, 

 and money enough to set them agoing, I could make 

 it worthy of the nineteenth century. One of the 

 members told me that the placing of bottles on a shelf 

 is nothing. Truly, old one ! any person with but one 

 eye might discover that, although it is not everything, 

 it is yet something which may be desperately mis- 

 managed. 



Museums with too many managers must be mis- 

 managed. Who ever heard of any great exploit 

 emanating from ten heads, although ten thousand 

 hands may have executed it. Did a journal with two 

 editors ever prosper ? Could two Audubons have drawn 

 the "Birds of America." If the ordination of the 

 Museum should go contrary to my ideas, let it go to 

 the condition in which it was when I received it. I 

 never seriously desired the appointment, never called 

 on a member for his vote, did not even inquire when 

 the election was to be, and do not now know who 

 voted for or against me. Having undertaken the 

 task, however, I am now interested in it ; but, my 

 boys, thwart a little, and you shall see that I can 



